


Methods For Growing Taller

by UnapologeticallyMeatwad



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Trans, Caspar is also Short, Edelgard is Short, Gen, Trans Caspar von Bergliez, Trans Edelgard von Hresvelg, and they're both trans, and trying to invent a way to get taller
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-18
Updated: 2020-07-18
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:33:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,604
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25361707
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UnapologeticallyMeatwad/pseuds/UnapologeticallyMeatwad
Summary: Edelgard and Caspar are both short and trans, and want to get taller ASAP. So they do some science.
Relationships: Caspar von Bergliez & Edelgard von Hresvelg
Comments: 1
Kudos: 14
Collections: Fire Emblem Trans Week 2020!





	Methods For Growing Taller

“Aw man, Linhardt eat your heart out!” Caspar cries out. He stands over a beaker of gaseous, purple— something — that is fuming like a volcano. He pumps both fists in the air. “Woo!” 

But when Edelgard says nothing, Caspar gets concerned. He turns around to find the girl wedged into the corner with both her arms crossed at her chest. “C’mon Edelgard, get excited! This is our first chemistry thing that’s like actually working, WOO!” 

Edelgard just frowns, and looks at Caspar with such disappointment.

Caspar frowns back and gestures at the glass beaker. “Don’t you WANT to get taller?”

Edelgard’s eyes go wide. “No, no, sh sh, Caspar.” She rushes him, presses a white gloved finger to his lips, bending him back against the lab table. “Not so loud, okay?”

Edelgard slips both hands onto his bindered-back chest and peeks around the corner, even though it is so late and the only one that could possibly wander into this room right now is either a drunken Hanneman ready to make some discoveries, or — Linhardt.

Linhardt is probably more apt to come in here late at night actually… and it’s not like anyone would ever come into the Garreg Mach lab during the day, peeps only be carin’ about magic. No love going to Caspar’s guy, Science. It’s too bad.

“Man,” Caspar moans, stepping away from Edelgard. “I thought you’d be more down for this, like, but I should’ve known. The second you forced me into tea time with the Professor and got  _ embarrassed  _ that I brought up methods of getting taller — agh!”

“Hey, hey,” Edelgard coos. “It’s not like that, Caspar.”

“You got shortie shame,” Caspar grunts.

Edelgard frowns and gets standoffish. Classic Edelgard. “Well, perhaps I have shortie shame because it’s unbecoming of someone of my stature — ”

Caspar snickers.

“ — shut it,” Edelgard deadpans. “Let’s say someone of my  _ rank _ , what would the people say if they knew I was… spending time trying to get taller?”

Caspar shrugs. “I dunno. I just want to be taller so I can beat more people up.”

Edelgard rolls her eyes. “You want to get taller because you’re trying to, um, ‘pass,’ more as a man, and I’m trying to tell you it doesn’t matter if you pass, you can just be who you want to be, and you are who you — um, want to be, sorry I’m flustered.”

“Me too,” Caspar sighs.

“And to the point of me not wanting people to know,” Edelgard continues, her temple throbbing. “What if Ferdinand found out? He’d go around being all  _ Oh, look at me! I’m taller than Edelgard, and height, I learned recently from my own sharpened intuition  _ — _ is something Edelgard cares very much about and now finally, I, Ferdinand Von Aegir, can declare himself superior to  _ — ”

“Yeah, I guess Linhardt would tease me too,” Caspar muses. “But I mean, like they’re just jokin’. I don’t think Ferdinand is even  _ that _ invested in being superior to you.”

Edelgard sighs, slipping both hands onto Caspar’s shoulders, eying the purple gas rising into the air. “Let’s just work to keep this between us, also I don’t think the potion we’re trying to make is supposed to turn into a gas like that.”

Caspar blinks. “Aw shit, you’re totally right.”

* * *

Two Moons Later

* * *

“Yo Hannie!” Caspar cries out from across the courtyard, his left hand raised way high over his head so that the ever busy professor will be able to spot him. Against her will, Caspar drags a blushing Edelgard along.

“Oh, Heavens, again with the nicknames, Caspar,” Hanneman’s frown is hardly visible beneath his gigantic mustache. He struts over to the two of them. “What is it this time, Caspar?”

“I made a thing!” Caspar pushes his heels off the grass. “Check it!”

Hanneman raises his eyebrows. “I… I don’t know what I’m looking at.” 

“Huh?” Caspar frowns. “I’m — taller, yeah?”

Hanneman strokes his chin. Edelgard shakes her head, slouching far deeper than an Emperor likely should. 

“I… am not familiar with your general height, young Caspar,” Hanneman sighs. “Perhaps you should confirm with Linhardt, he might be a better — ” Hanneman freezes, eyes going wide before his pupils shrink inward. He sniffs loudly. “Heavens, what is that?” He sniffs again.

Caspar folds his hands behind his back. Edelgard groans. “Caspar, we shouldn’t be bothering Professor Hanneman like this…”

Hanneman holds out a hand to freeze them, sniffing even more. “Boy, you smell wretched. Why — I can’t think of a single classroom that would hold such foul smelling concoctions aside from… my personal collection!”

Caspar winces.

Edelgard’s eyebrows nearly make it past her gigantic forehead. “You told me you  _ borrowed _ the new stuff from Hanneman…” she mutters.

“Heh,” Caspar forces a rather unbecoming smirk.

“Oof,” Hanneman pinches the bridge of his nose. “I’d punish you myself, but I supposed that can be up to your House Leader. Edelgard, stealing from faculty like this is unaccepta—” Hanneman freezes again and Edelgard’s heart stops. He sniffs. “—oh no,  _ et tu Edelgard? _ ”

Edelgard blinks. “Wh-what?”

“Oh, just a little reference to a play I just read,” Hanneman smiles to himself. “A play I just read for  _ I _ am a scholar! Ahem, I should, erm, excuse myself. But please do not steal from me again.” He walks past them, pausing to give a meaningful look to Caspar. “I know you wish to be taller, but it seems you have possibly grown an inch naturally. Progress is progress, you know!”

He walks off.

Caspar frowns and falls back into being flat footed. “Damn.”

“It’s alright,” Edelgard sighs, slinging an arm around Caspar’s shoulders. “You are growing. Much more manly.”

“Yeah, but,” Caspar shakes his head and very delicately removes Edelgard’s arm. “You’re supposed to get taller too.”

“It’s fine if I don’t,” Edelgard sighs. “I’ll keep winning fights, you know that. You’re the one who needs the extra edge.”

“Hey!” Caspar yelps. “Why you gotta be like that? C’mon, let’s get taller together!”

Edelgard whips her head back at Caspar, and suddenly her gaze is much heavier than usual. Though a centimeter shorter than Caspar — Caspar would of course know this — he feels very small besides her.

“Leave it,” Edelgard’s tone is cold and harsh. She frowns immediately after, biting her lip. “Sorry, it’s just… it’s okay. If we must engage in something so silly, let it be something else.”

* * *

Five Years Later

* * *

Caspar finds Edelgard near the cemetery at Garreg Mach; though Byleth has been proven to be alive and well for many moons now, Edelgard is still often found here. Always grieving for someone. Tonight’s mourning is probably for Randolph who gave his life for the Empire recently.

Caspar should probably grieve for Randolph, but he hardly knew him. Tonight, he just wants to see Edelgard and hang out. It’s been a while.

“Yo, Edelgard,” he says, slipping in front of her. 

Edelgard raises her head and smiles, reaching out and ruffling his hair. “Goodness, you’re tall. I keep forgetting. Does it make you happier, do you think?”

Caspar shrugs. “Eh, it’s alright. I think I let the teasing get back to me, being short’s not so bad. We still fight stuff that’s taller than us all the time, like I punched a big worm in the face the other day and it was…” He imagines it wriggling’ in agony and it makes him snicker. Caspar runs a finger across his lips, eying Edelgard still. “But I’m always a man, no matter how tall.”

Edelgard smiles. 

Caspar smiles back. “Why was your shortie shame so bad, back then?”

Edelgard rolls her eyes, likely at the uneducated term  _ shortie shame _ . But she still smirks. “It’s… the disease I have, from the twin Crests implanted into my body.”

Caspar frowns. He sort of knows about this, but he doesn’t really know the full story, not that he expects Edelgard to give him the spiel; he’d rather she didn’t if it’s just going to make her feel sad.

“I don’t get to live as long as you and the others,” Edelgard sighs. “And… well…” She pushes a hand into her tightly wound bun of white hair. “...I don’t really get to grow either.”

Caspar feels something leave him, like his soul or something, he didn’t expect anything like that. “Edelgard…”

Edelgard nods, clasping her hands together. “...anything you came up with, I don’t know, it was selfish of me but I knew it wouldn’t help me and that made me angry. It was childish, I’m sorry.”

Caspar is still sort of speechless. Damn. But Caspar is never speechless! He’s always yelling! Hyarrrghhh!

Caspar scoops Edelgard up into his bicep, her hands lash out in a panic and wrap around his neck. Heh, smooth moves. Too bad Edelgard is like a sister to him. “Do any of the smart people know about this?”

“Um,” Edelgard frowns. “Linhardt, Lysithea, and Hanneman have inferred, but — no, they’re too busy with important things. No one should be spending time worrying about my health, I’ll make it work and — oh no, you’re carrying me there, aren’t you?”

“Yup,” Caspar grins to himself. “You should’ve just said something earlier, Edelgard.”

Edelgard leans her forehead up against his shoulder. Caspar wonders if that’s even comfortable with all the armor he wears on the reg nowadays. “There’s a lot of things I wanted to say back then.”

“Well, uh,” Caspar sighs. “Ya know, we both know this because we came out in our teens, before school, but it’s never too late to bring stuff up, Edelgard.”

Edelgard hitches closer to Caspar; she doesn’t say anything else. Caspar doesn’t either. Neither of them need to.

**Author's Note:**

> You can [follow me on Twitter](https://twitter.com/IAmLordMeatwad) for tweets about my cats and fanfic, and [follow me on Insta](https://www.instagram.com/katrinajagelski/) for similar stuff. Occasionally I do live reads for my original fiction and fanfic.


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